Byte invests in digital signatures

Byte is investing several millions of its capital in modern technologies, aiming to expand its customer base by developing new services. After two years of preparing infrastructure and staffing its Trust Center (certified by Ernst and Young), Byte is now one of the three companies in Greece offering digital signature services and registered with the Greek National Telecommunications & Post Commission (EETT) as a certified digital signature provider.

Its customer base already includes more than 60,000 doctors and pharmacists, who have acquired their own signatures through Byte. Byte intends on including other professionals into its customer base, both from the private and the public sector. The company is already negotiating with bailiff associations. At the same time, as it is noted, any business that wants to participate in public tenders exceeding 60,000 euro that are required by law to be published on the national electronic procurement system, must have a digital signature – this being an important business opportunity for Byte as a trading IT company.

As the President and Managing Director of Byte, Spyros Vizantios, stated to Naftemporiki, “There are already many professional groups that are required to use digital signatures. Very shortly, this requirement will extend to a very broad range of business activities. For example, lawyers and court officials are already using digital signatures to electronically submit legal cases. Notaries, accountants and tax advisors are opting for digital signatures for practical and security reasons. Doctors and pharmacists are already using digital signatures on a daily basis for electronic prescriptions. The same applies to companies from various industries that are interested in securing their documents and transactions.”

According to Byte, the digital signature product they provide in Greece is based on a unique code that uses asymmetrical public key encryption to authenticate senders and prove the authenticity of documents and messages. Digital signatures are equally binding as hard-written signatures, but they provide greater security as they cannot be forged and they are unique and different for every document.

When digitally signing a document, its content is protected, cannot be modified and cannot be disowned. Digital signatures ensure data protection against unauthorized access, modification or replacement, while they also verify the sender’s identity. At the same time, digital signatures warrant that the sender cannot deny having sent the message. Digital signatures are based on a pair of electronic keys – a private and a public key. The private key is used to create the signature and the public key is used to verify it.

The sender uses the private key to encrypt the message and verify his/her identity to the recipient. The private key of each person is embedded and securely stored in the cryptographic chip of a USB token/smart card. The token is the necessary hardware that a person should have in order to get a digital signature.